Draxtor Despres' mixed-reality interview series just keeps getting better and better. The latest episode of The Drax Files: World Makers highlights MadPea Games, a group who create immersive storytelling environments and game experiences within SL. Kiana Writer spoke for the group and had quite a few interesting things to say about what they do and why... But more on that in a bit. Check out the full episode for yourself, first:

To mark 10 years of Second Life, iO9's Charlie Jane Anders has an epic history of virtual reality in pop culture from the last 40 years, starting with a 70's TV mini-series by German film great Rainer Werner Fassbinder (who knew?), and more or less ending with 2010's Tron remake. One notable point: Just about every single one of these visions of virtual reality is pretty horrible in some way. Either it's covering up some dark aspects of human nature (which is why murders and such keep breaking out there), or it's draining us of our humanity in some devious way. (And in The Matrix, VR is used to literally drain humans.) But none of these visions of VR basically say: "Virtual reality is a great place worth living in as much as possible, because it makes the human race better to be there." I'd say the one possible exception is the holodeck of the Star Trek franchise, which presents VR in a fairly neutral light -- it's often a useful tool and a fun, occasional hobby (even though, again, things go wildly wrong there all the time) -- but even then, it's not a utopia, and the rest of the show implies the real world is still far more preferable.

There's an interesting new game available today, and although it might seem like nothing special at first blush, it's definitely not your parents' action platformer. In Cellar Door Games' Rogue Legacy your goal (at least in the short-term) is to die. Die splendidly, die stupidly, die often. Just make sure that you die with a few coins in your pocket to pass down to your children so that they'll be better equipped than you were.

If you're a lawyer or another kind of expert in American legal practice and you have a subscription to American Lawyer magazine, I'd love your help. Thing is, I'm not a lawyer nor do I play one on the Internet, nor can I read in full The American Lawyer's article on the matter, since it's paywalled, but it looks like several Second Life landowners who lost their SL property after their accounts were suspended just accepted a class action settlement from Linden Lab. And the class action lawsuit was filed on behalf of 57,000+ SL users in a particular category of land owners. Specifically, as this 2012 class action granting decision designates:

It's easy enough to see why some people might see her post as a bit of a personal insult, but even if the post itself rubs you the wrong way Botgirl has some great advice that virtual artists (both aspiring and established) should pay attention to... And so do I.

Last Sunday as many Second Life users were celebrating the world's 10th anniversary, a group of people who had helped create the world itself quietly gathered there to have their own celebration too. Led in part by Babbage Linden, a steampunk gentleman with a bronze robot arm, many Linden Lab employees (mostly past, but some present) assembled in the Corn Field, which is the place that naughty SLers were once sent in banishment. (Created by Daniel Linden, it was his wry tribute to a famous Twilight Zone episode.)

"I thought our little SL10B party was a great combination of remembering old times in Da Boom and the Corn Field and being dazzled by WindLight skies, shadows and Osprey's amazing meshes at SL10B -- awesome," Babbage tells me now. "I also gave away my last non-copy Babbage Linden Bear to a collector at the Linden Bear Museum, which was fun." Babbage left the company in 2010, riding out of San Francisco on his longboard, and lately he's better known as Jim Purbrick, software engineer at Facebook.

So they gathered there and shared memories and occasionally danced. Many SLers tell me they believe all Lindens are indifferent to Second Life, and just consider it a job. But the Corn Field tells another story.

After the break, a rundown of the Lindens (and some non-Lindens, and some Lindens in their alts) pictured above: